Chrome browser starts blocking disruptive ads

Google’s Chrome has declared war on ads, something that does sound incredible considering that ads happen to be the lifeline of the company’s revenues. In fact, the campaign has already started with the Chrome’s built-in ad-blocker getting activated from today itself.

Google, however, has said all of its efforts are aimed at establishing better standards for ads. Also, unlike ad blocker extensions that are widely used, Chrome won’t be blocking all ads. Rather, Google stressed its entire campaign is outlined by the guidelines formulated by the Coalition for Better Ads. Further, ads on both desktop and mobile segments are being targeted.

So among the ads that Chrome would be targeting on the desktop from hence including pop-up ads, sticky ads that users don’t have the option to do away with, and those that show a countdown timer and block the view for a particular period. Also audio/video ads with sound that starts playing the moment the site loads is also being banned from now onwards.

Similarly, Chrome will also be banishing similar ads on mobiles. Those include pop up ads, ads with a countdown timer that block the entire screen for some time, video ads that play automatically with sound and sticky ads. Also, all ads that tend to cover more than a third of the mobile display will also be removed.

Google said those sites that have ads of the type mentioned above would first be served a warning and a month’s time to mend their ways. After that, only those sites will be allowed to carry ads that comply with the set guidelines, while the others will have all their ads stripped off, not just the ones that fails the compliance test.

All of the above can also be linked to Google’s own survival given its heavy reliance on ads for its revenue. However, the rampant and largely unorganized manner that sites had started to display ads led to the rise of a distinct class of plugins, that of ad blockers. Those again are rather in discriminatory as it tends to block all ads and not just the annoying ones.

Under the circumstances, Google’s latest efforts can well be seen as an attempt to hit the middle grounds of sorts. With the more disrupting ones kept out of the way, Google is hoping the better ones continue to remain in existence, which again is where its revenues come from.

Google meanwhile has also claimed more that 42 percent sites with disruptive ads have already agreed to abide by the Better Ads guidelines, which is an indication their efforts are yielding fruit. It remains to be seen though how things pan out over a period of time.